


Couldn't Drag Me Away

by threemeows



Series: Wild Horses [9]
Category: To All the Boys I've Loved Before (Movies), To All the Boys I've Loved Before Series - Jenny Han
Genre: whoop?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-11
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:07:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26940388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/threemeows/pseuds/threemeows
Summary: Peter and Lara Jean go back home to attend his half-brother's wedding. Takes place immediately after "You Know I Can't Let You Slide Through My Hands" and is part of the Wild Horses universe.
Relationships: Peter Kavinsky & Lara Jean Song-Covey, Peter Kavinsky/Lara Jean Song-Covey
Series: Wild Horses [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1170389
Comments: 31
Kudos: 101





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of my series, Wild Horses. You'll have to read that monstrosity to know what's going on. But basically, PK and LJ are married, living in NYC with two kids. It's basically strictly based on the first movie, except the kiddos grew up in Virginia and LJ went to UNC and Peter went to UVA, like in the books. 
> 
> Also, haha, I have no idea if I'm continuing this beyond this? But whatever. I'm trying to dump out all my unfinished stuff, of which there are a lot.

“iPad?” Lara Jean asks, surveying the mountain of bags and luggage crammed into their already tight hallway.  
  
“Check.” Peter points to her canvas tote.  
  
“Snacks?”  
  
“God forbid we leave without applesauce,” he says, lifting the brightly colored reusable shopping bag. “And chips and pretzels and fruit loops ...”  
  
“I was talking about our snacks.”  
  
Peter kneels down and unzips the small backpack cooler next to the shopping bag. As he flips the lid he smirks up at her. Inside are juice boxes, bottles of pumped milk, and ... Yakult.  
  
Lara Jean shakes her head, smiling. “Ready to go, little dude?” she croons, hefting the car seat up. Daniel peers up at her but doesn’t respond, too overwhelmed by the sheer amount of stuff surrounding them and the flurry of the early morning activity.  
  
“Roooooad trip!” Aiden declares, bouncing up and down with his arms in a V. He grabs Peter’s hand and starts lugging him to the front door. Lara Jean snorts. Does he even know what a road trip is?  
  
Downstairs, she pushes the door to their building open and just barely suppresses her laughter. She clicks Danny first into the car, then helps buckle Aiden into his car seat, as Peter loads the back of the rental with the rest of their stuff. She makes sure to keep the bags containing their snacks up in front with her. Then she pulls up Waze on her phone and puts it up on the dashboard holder.  
  
“What?” Peter asks when he finally slides into the driver’s side. He checks the mirrors before he pulls the Jeep onto the road.  
  
“You always pick a Jeep,” she says, shaking her head fondly. When they first moved out here for grad school, he had to leave his car behind with his mother - there was simply no way they could deal with having a car in New York City at the time. Ellen gave it to Owen for college - and unfortunately, two years later, a careless driver ran a stoplight and totaled it. Owen wasn’t hurt, but the Jeep wasn’t salvageable, not at its age, and since by then there was no definitely no use for a car in the middle of the city, they never got a replacement. Anytime they ever needed to drive, they rented. And it was always a Jeep.  
  
“I just miss that car,” he says, heading towards FDR. He grumbles, “Should’ve never let O borrow it.”  
  
Lara Jean stifles her laughter with the back of her hand. She checks the visor mirror. Aiden is staring out the window, into the predawn of the city. She can’t see Danny since his car seat is rear-facing. Both kids have been out of NYC before, of course - but this will be the first time going back to Virginia for Danny.  
  
Back home.  
  
As they pull onto FDR, she looks at Peter. He looks fine - completely at ease. But she knows him. Everett’s wedding is going to be weird - with, or without, their father coming. Which they all still don’t know for sure if he is.  
  
She’s not even sure if Grant Kavinsky knows he’s got another grandson.  
  
*  
  
“Baaaaby shark do do do do do. Baby shark do do do do do do. Baby shark -“  
  
“Aiden, bud, please,” Peter moans, thumping the back of his head on the headrest. Traffic creeps forward on I-95. They are somewhere in Jersey. Not far enough down in Jersey though.  
  
“Mooooommy shark do do do do do. Mommy shark -“  
  
Lara Jean rubs the bridge of her nose. “Honey, do you want the iPad?” she asks, desperately. That always works.  
  
“Nope!” Aiden says, brightly, for the first time in his young life. He bangs his legs against the rim of his car seat, loudly. Persistently. “Daaaaaddy shark do do do do ... Daddy shark ...”  
  
Daniel begins to whine.  
  
“It’s ok Danny,” Peter mutters under Aiden's singing, just as the baby’s voice reaches to a shrill. “I’m about to make you a single child.”  
  
Lara Jean leans her forehead against the window and takes a deep breath.  
  
“Graaaaandpa shark ...”  
  
*  
  
They stop at a McDonalds for a potty break for Aiden and a diaper change and a feed for Danny. It fortunately has an indoor soft playground so they give Aidan a few minutes to run amok and exhaust himself. Lara Jean watches him climb through the tubes and netting on a bench, Danny sucking greedily underneath her flowered cover-up. Through the droop of the cover-up, she smiles gently at him, the curve of his eyelashes against his soft, round cheeks making her heart warm over. Her milk is drying up, and it has been very tough go of breast-feeding this time around, and he's getting older. She doubts she can make it a year, like she barely managed to do with Aiden, not with her job and dealing with two kids now at once. The idea that this little one is growing up - faster than Aiden ever seemed, and their time with Aiden _flew_ \- is making her eyes sting.

Peter pushes open the glass door with his back, holding two coffees.  
  
“Oh, give it here,” Lara Jean says, hastily pressing her thumb and forefinger into her eyes, as if she's tired, not on the verge of crying. No tears spill.  
  
Gratefully, he doesn't notice. “These are for me,” he jokes, but passes her one. He doesn’t take a seat, but stands there, watching Aiden play. He takes a big swig of his coffee.  
  
“Think it’ll be weird?” he asks, eventually.  
  
_Yes_. “No, not at all.” She tracks Aiden as he climbs up some padded blocks to the massive yellow slide. Too tall. And that memory from over a year ago spikes through her, unbidden, of hearing that scared shout from Peter and then that tumble like a bag of thundering bricks, of seeing the both of them at the bottom of the landing and her baby screaming like he was dying ... _He’ll hurt himself. He’ll hit his head and he’ll_ \- “Peter, tell him to stop.”  
  
“He’s gonna be fine.” Peter says it through the side of his mouth, watching Aiden. He says it easily.  
  
“It’s too high -“  
  
“Hey Mommy! Watch me!” Aiden yells.  
  
“Okay honey,” she trills back, gulping down a wince and the mad flutter of fear in her heart.  
  
His little _wa-hoooo!_ echoes down through the yellow tube. He pops up at Peter’s feet, completely unscathed.  
  
“Way to go, kid,” Peter says, holding out his hand for a fist bump.  
  
Aiden obliges, but then glares at their coffee cups. “Where’s my fries?” he demands, pouting.


	2. Chapter 2

“Peter? Peter, wake up.”

Peter starts awake, blinking in the darkness for a brief moment before it’s swarmed suddenly in golden light. He hisses, pressing his forefinger and thumb into his eyelids at the abrupt change, before he hears the little, tortured wail. “What time is it?” he mumbles, sitting up in bed and holding out his arms.

Lara Jean places Danny, fussy and whining, into his lap. “Just past 3:00 am. He’s got a fever, and I forgot to pack the children’s Motrin.”

“Ahhh, shit,” he mumbles, pressing his lips against Danny’s forehead. Sure enough, he’s burning up – his cheeks look like he’s gone through LJ’s makeup stash, two spots of ruddy pink streaked with tears.

“Could you ask your mom - ?”

“I don’t think she’ll have anything in the house,” Peter admits. As if in response, Danny sticks his finger in his mouth and squeals in pain. “Okay, bud. Shh. Shh. You’ll wake your brother up.” He stands up, and pushes Danny back at her, gently. “What do you think it is?” The benefits of having a doctor for a wife.

Lara Jean shrugs, yawning. “Could be anything. I don’t think it’s his teeth. Probably just yet another virus he picked up from daycare.”

“I’ll go to the pharmacy.”

“Will it be open?”

He hesitates. They’re used to living where everything’s open, all the time. Then he grabs his phone at the side of the bed and Googles. “There’s one off the highway.”

“Okay. I’ll run a cold bath.”

He nods, starts digging through their suitcase haphazardly. By the time he’s thrown on a shirt and sweatpants, Lara Jean’s just setting the baby down into the tub. “Well, there’s a good thing about all of this,” he says, giving her a quick kiss on the temple.

“What’s that?” she murmurs, wringing out a washcloth in the cold water. She sets it on top of Danny’s head, like a floppy hat. The baby blinks up at both of them, and bats at the bathwater with his palms, splashing diffidently. At least he’s stopped whining.

“Maybe we don’t have to go to this stupid wedding.”

He says it carelessly, but Lara Jean looks at him, confused. “I thought you wanted to go.”

He gives her a quick, easy smile. “Just joking.”

She nods, sleepily. “Okay. Um, just hurry.”

At CVS, right before he checks out with infant Motrin in hand, he stops by the candy aisle, feeling guilty as he searches for a pack of lollipops for the boys and some chocolate for Lara Jean. The truth is, he _doesn’t_ want to go to the wedding – it’s going to be weird. Even if Dad _doesn’t_ show, supposedly, Jillian will be there too – and he’s never even met his younger, half-sister.

And he feels bad for Lara Jean, because he knows the reason she asked him to hurry wasn’t just because she was worried about Danny. Staying over at Mom’s was necessary – Margot and Ravi and their girls are camped out at Dan and Trina’s for the week, Ash and Kitty will be down soon too, and there’s simply no room. But even though their relationship had mended – slightly – over the years, he knows it’s still awkward for his wife sometimes to be in forced close proximity with his mother.

And vice versa.

*

“Mommy?”

Sitting by the edge of the bathtub, Lara Jean looks up to see Aiden pushing open the bathroom door wider, rubbing his eye with his fist and blinking at her. When he does that, he reminds her of Peter, not a half hour before.

“Hey, baby,” she murmurs, holding out her arm. Aiden scurries forward and nestles onto her lap. She rests her chin on top of his wavy head of hair.

In the tub, Danny flings the washcloth down at the tiled wall, huffing.

Aiden yawns. “Why is baby brother taking a bath?”

“Baby brother’s got a fever, so we’re gonna try and cool him down.”

“Where’s Dad?”

“Getting medicine from the store.”

“I don’t have to take medicine, do I?”

Thank god no, Lara Jean almost says. He always throws the wildest fits – the last time he was sick, Peter had to pin down his flailing arms with his knees and pry his mouth open while Lara Jean sat on his legs and poured the sticky bubblegum-flavored Motrin down his throat. All that accomplished was two bitten fingers and Aiden throwing up Peter’s blood _and_ the Motrin all over the front of Lara Jean’s top, straight down to her bra.

They both look up at the knock on the doorjamb. Ellen peers blearily in, wrapping her robe more tightly around her. “Lara Jean? Is everything all right?”

“Hi, Grandma!” Aiden chirps, as if it isn’t hideously early in the morning. “Danny is sick.”

“He’s got a little fever,” Lara Jean says, immediately, to reassure her.

“Oh no,” Ellen says, walking in. “Hey buddy boy.”

“Buh,” Danny says, taking the washcloth again and slapping it against the faucet. He cackles at the sound.

“I think I have some Children’s Tylenol somewhere,” Ellen says, checking underneath the sink. “Last time Owen and Carli were here, the girls were sick.”

“Oh, that’s okay, Peter went out to get some stuff,” Lara Jean says, not wanting to trouble her.

“You should’ve woken me,” Ellen says, head behind the cabinet door.

Lara Jean bites her lip, unsure of what to say. Is that judgment? Admonishment? Nothing at all? She can never really tell with her mother-in-law. Lara Jean would always say – and mean it, unequivocally – that she’d never change the way she and Peter met and fell in love – even the bad, heartbreaking parts where they were broken up as kids. But that one, brief period their junior year of high school – when she was so confused and mixed up about Peter and Gen and John Ambrose and she had broken up with Peter – that had seemed to permanently taint her relationship with Ellen, enough to convince her mother-in-law to interfere right before they went off to college. As a teenager she couldn’t comprehend – as a mother herself now, riddled with worries about bills and her children, she’s now beginning to understand.

But just like her husband is still very much that surly teenage boy with a chip on his shoulder about his father and extended family, she’s still that scared teenage girl who just wants to be nice to everybody and make things right.

“It was so early – we didn’t want to wake you – and uh, Peter offered – ”

“Yes, well, that boy never bothers checking first,” Ellen says, lightly enough. She emerges, a bottle of children’s Tylenol and plastic dropper syringe in hand. She squints at the label. “Still in date,” she says, triumphant.

“Thanks.” Lara Jean takes the medicine from her and measures it out. Danny, fortunately, is too young to put up a fuss and takes the grape flavored Tylenol easily, even smacking his chops at the end. The women laugh and Ellen grabs a towel to help dry him off. Ellen takes Aiden back to bed, and Lara Jean settles onto the bed in Peter’s old room, nursing Danny to get him back to sleep. With the fever and medicine in him, he drops off quickly, but she’s wide awake now. She sets him gently back into the pack-n-play next to the bed, and pads downstairs to make a cup of coffee and text Peter.

To her surprise, Ellen is downstairs, already brewing the coffee. “Oh, um, you didn’t have – ” Lara Jean says.

Ellen waves her off. “No trouble. These days, I don’t sleep much. Age will do that to you.” Lara Jean sits awkwardly at the island, while Ellen busies herself collecting ingredients for pancakes. “What are your plans for today?”

Lara Jean fiddles with the sleeves of her sweatshirt. “Oh. Well, um, we’re gonna shop for a wedding present for Everett and Malika.”

“Oh, I would’ve thought you already got one in New York,” Ellen says.

Lara Jean smiles tightly at her. “No, we, uh, ran out of time.” The truth is, she’d kept suggesting things to Peter, who kept shrugging it off with “maybes,” and “nahs,” and “yeah I guesses” and then suddenly it was time to go back home and they hadn’t gotten anything. Peter had ended up suggesting a gift card, or a check, but to Lara Jean it felt extremely impersonal for the wedding of one’s brother.

It had bothered her tremendously that Peter hadn’t seemed to bother with anything to do with the wedding. Sure, money is a practical gift for a young couple just starting out together – something they themselves would’ve definitely welcomed with enthusiasm ten years ago – but Lara Jean has always rather liked getting the happy couple something special, unique. With Owen and Carli, she made a scrapbook, with shots that she’d pinched from their Instagrams or her own phone, and in between the ceremony and the reception, she’d dashed off to the nearest grocery store and printed off the perfect picture she’d managed to snap during the vows, gluing it to the final page before slipping the album into a gift bag. Her sister-in-law had been ecstatic, and since then, it’s just something Lara Jean _does_ when she knows the couple well enough.

But Everett – and Clayton – well . . . they all follow each other on social media, and occasionally there will be a like from the both of them on a post of the kids, and a vague interaction from Peter – _Thanks, man_ or a _Yeah we’re good how r u_ – but it’s all so stilted, so weird. She doesn’t feel right swiping some shots off of Everett’s Twitter, and she doesn’t follow Malika on anything. She’s never even met Malika. _Peter’s_ never met Malika.

So it’s this weird thing, compared to Peter’s relationship with Owen, where they’re constantly texting each other rude things or gifs, and acting – well, like, brothers. Where Carli can send Peter a text playfully ribbing him for not teaching his brother manners. Where Lara Jean can FaceTime Ravi and yell with him about how much JK Rowling’s social media antics are horrific.

And she doesn’t want to push it, because the last time she pushed on anything to do with Peter’s side of the family – well, she doesn’t like to think about it. It was a long time ago, they were both very young, but it taught her a very big lesson on how to deal with her now-husband. It’s a miracle her gentle persuasion to come to this wedding even succeeded.

The front door opens. “Hey,” she calls quietly from the kitchen. Peter treads in, surprised to see both of them. “Your mom saved the day.”

“As always. Thanks, Mom,” he says, giving her a quick kiss on the cheek. He sets the plastic bag on the island.

She nods, pats him on the chest. “There’s coffee.”

“Actual fucking lifesaver.”

“ _Peter_ , _”_ Ellen and Lara Jean say together.

“What? The kids aren’t here.” He pours cups for the three of them, as Lara Jean digs through the bag. Children’s Motrin, lollipops for the boys, and a bag of Ghirardelli chocolate squares.

She smiles wryly up at him, gratified. He winks at her over the rim of his mug, then turns to his mother to talk. As she watches them chatter, and glances at the bag of chocolate, it occurs to her she’s not the only one who’s dancing around difficult family dynamics – and who has a spouse who’s painfully, silently aware of it all.

-tbc-


	3. Chapter 3

“Ooo. A blender? For smoothies?”

“Nah. Pass.”

“Okay . . . how about a waffle maker?”

“That’s just gonna sit in their cupboards collecting dust. They’re gonna, like, re-gift it for the first wedding they’re invited to.”

“Okay. I see your point. Maybe a food processor? Everyone needs a good food processor!”

“Think Owen got them that.”

Lara Jean turns her back on Peter and morphs her face into a silent scream of irritation at the shiny displays of brand new kitchen equipment. They’d left Danny with Ellen, and brought Aiden with them, now that he can be somewhat trusted to behave in the shopping cart watching YouTube videos on Lara Jean’s phone. What was supposed to be a relaxing morning is rapidly turning into one of frustration.

Trying to gather herself, she strolls down the aisle, trailing her fingers over the displays of cooking utensils. “Peter?”

Behind her, Peter mumbles something vague as he pushes the cart forward.

She gathers herself. “Honey?” No answer. “Baby? Sweetie? Love of my life and father of my children?”

“Hmm?”

“Why are we even here?”

“Hmm? Aiden, bud, don’t stand in the cart. Hey, maybe we should pick up a teething for ring for Danny. You know, the ones you can put in the freezer? Just in case it _is_ his teeth.”

“Oh, yeah, that is a good idea,” Lara Jean says, turning to face him.

He’s already backing out of the aisle with the cart. “I’ll go find it. And some Orajel maybe.”

“But what about – ” Lara Jean splutters, nonplussed.

“Bye, Mom!” Aiden waves, laughing over the edge of the cart.

“Aiden, sit down before you fall over – ”

“Sit _down,_ ” Peter barks, pressing on his shoulder to get him to sit. “Meet you at checkout.”

“But we haven’t even – ” Peter turns the corner, not hearing.

Lara Jean stomps her foot, and turns back to the appliances, rolling her eyes. Grumpy and out of sorts, she looks at the shiny shelves.

And then she spots . . . _it._

“Oooo.”

*

“Oooo, that looks nice.” Aiden says, making grabby-hands at a giraffe teething ring.

Peter bats his hands away. “You’ve got a full set of chompers last time I checked,” he says. Aiden looks up at him, uncomprehending. “That’s for your teeth. For Baby Danny. His teeth are bothering him.” He pauses. “Well, we think.” It’s hard to tell. Aiden never had teething problems, so this is new territory for everyone.

“So he’s gonna chew on that?” Aiden asks. Peter nods, searching the display for something that he can toss in the freezer. “You said not to put toys in my mouth!”

“It’s not a toy, it’s a – ” Peter sighs, and picks up one shaped like an elephant’s head. “Okay, it looks like a toy, but it’s specifically for babies to put in their mouths.”

“That makes no sense.”

“Tell me about it. Do you think he’ll like this one?” He holds up the elephant teething ring.

Aiden screws his face up in disgust and goes back to Lara Jean’s phone.

Peter huffs out a disbelieving laugh and decides on the giraffe teething ring instead. Just as he’s wheeling into the first aid aisle, his phone pings.

_Hi Peter and LJ – Are you still interested in the duplex on Grand? Buyer fell through last minute and seller’s agent reached out. No rush, I know you guys are away for a bit, and I think we got em where we want em. Just let me know._

Peter frowns over the baby Orajel packaging, puts it in the shopping cart next to the teething ring, and re-reads the text message from their realtor, trying to remember which duplex on Grand. They’d been up and down Brooklyn and Queens trying to find something since they found out Lara Jean was pregnant with Danny.

All of a sudden, it hits him – yes. They had found it right before Lara Jean went back to work. She’d been hesitant because it was too modern for her tastes – outside and in, but she liked the neighborhood and at the time, they were desperately looking for anything that could contain the four of them. But he’d loved it because it was exactly the kind of place he thought he’d wanted when he was eighteen years old and gallivanting around New York City for the first time ever – slick and tricked out with all the amenities, and there was a spacious wrap-around balcony with walls high enough that even Aiden couldn’t escape. They’d put an offer in, and despite not making it work, he ended up privately relieved – it really was too much money at the time.

“Where’s Mom?” Aiden asks, tugging at his elbow.

“We’re gonna find her right now,” Peter promises, pushing the cart towards the exit.

He spots Lara Jean easily at the registers, clutching a box – a KitchenAid mixer. The expensive kind. The exact kind she used to own, before they had kids and they had to store it away to make room for all the endless baby-and-young-child things parents need on their battered, already-too-cramped kitchen countertops. She’d dusted it off a few months ago, and it worked the first couple of times, but then it went kablooey and she’d been in a bad mood about it for weeks. “You really want to get them _that?_ ” he says.

“No,” she grumbles, placing it gingerly in the cart next to Aiden. “That’s for me. This is for them.” She holds out a gift card. “The boys and I will make a card for them. You can sign it.”

He barely looks at the gift card. “Are you sure? You barely have time for it as it is.”

For some reason, the dark look on her face turns several shades darker. “I’m sure.”

Well. He’s stepped into it. Fortunately, Aiden decides to grab a bag of chips from the register. “Oooo, chippies!” he declares, moving to rip open the red packaging.

“Aiden! We’re going to Grandpa’s for lunch!” Lara Jean exclaims.

“But I’m hungry!” he protests.

“ _Aid_ , come on, just wait a few more minutes – ” Peter says, snatching the bag out of his little hands.

The inevitable happens. Aiden throws himself onto the floor of the cart, face-first, and shrieks, kicking his legs. “But I _want_ them I’m hungry I’m hungry I’m so _hungryyyyy_!”

Peter glances at Lara Jean, her lips pinched into a straight line, and he takes one look at the suburban housewives clucking their disapproving tongues at them. And then he hauls Aiden out of the cart and outside into the crisp spring air in a fireman’s carry, towards the rental car, without further ado. He lets him cry it out in his car seat, counting down mentally 200 as slowly as he can to calm himself down and not absolutely lose his shit like his son, as they wait for Lara Jean to finish up purchasing everything. One judgey old lady glares at him through the windows as she gets into her car next to theirs, and Peter just gives her a _Fuck off_ glare that frightens her out of her parking spot in a hurry.

Once Lara Jean plops into the passenger seat, she folders her arms over the top of the mixer box and buries her face into them, groaning. Peter checks over his shoulder at Aiden – he’s quieted, nose red with sniffles, but he’s still murmuring about how hungry he is.

“You good?” he asks, softly, patting the back of her head.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay,” she says, looking up at him. She grabs his hand and kisses it, then seems to hesitate.

“What?”

“ . . . Do you think a gift card is enough?”

“Yeah. Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Just . . .” She pauses again, and then says, “It’s just so impersonal. For. You know, one sibling to another.”

Peter shrugs, awkward, as he turns back to the wheel and starts the car. It’s hard to explain, even to Lara Jean. Especially to Lara Jean. “I guess it is,” he admits, backing out of the parking spot. “But – you know – we didn’t really grow up together. Everett’s only my half-sibling.”

“Yeah, but half-siblings are still siblings.”

“Yeah. But like I said, we barely know each other.”

“I thought you wanted to know each other, though.”

Peter shifts in his seat at the stoplight out of the parking lot. “I guess I thought I did, too,” he says.

“Thought?”

“Yeah, thought.” It comes out a lot more terse than he meant it to be, and Lara Jean sits back in her seat. “It’s just weird, okay? And a new toaster oven or a blender isn’t going to miraculously make it less weird.” He pauses. “I know you mean well. But it just . . . doesn’t.”

The car behind them honks at the delay. Peter makes the turn, heading back to the old house. In the corner of his eye, he can see her finally shrug her shoulders, and she says, eventually, “ . . . Okay. Okay.”

He reaches out and grabs her hand – she squeezes, once, and doesn’t let go. Peter checks the rearview mirror. Aiden has temporarily passed out from his tantrum – all the traveling and excitement and waking up in the middle of the night having taken it’s toll. “So, I got a text from Jackson,” he says, to fill up the silence.

“Mmm? He find anything new?”

“Old, actually.” At the next red light, he nods at her. “You remember that place on Grand?”

She furrows her brow. “The duplex? The super modern one?”

“Yeah. Buyer bailed. Seller reached out to him.” Green. He eases onto the highway.

“Really? Huh . . . well, I mean, it was . . .”

“What?” he asks, surprised at her hesitance. “You liked it.”

“I did. Yeah.” She sighs and looks out her window, at the cars whizzing by. “It was just – you know. Modern.” Then she adds, “And really expensive.”

“The brownstone was really expensive.”

She sighs louder. “They’re _all_ really expensive.”

He can feel the beginnings of a frown coming on. He’d thought she’d be a little more excited about the prospect, especially since they very clearly aren’t going to get any brownstones anytime soon. “Is this about the wedding?”

“What? Huh?”

“I mean – look, I said it was weird, okay? I think that’s valid.”

“Yes, of course it’s valid,” she says, confused.

“So, then why don’t you want to put another offer on the duplex?”

She lets go of his hand, and spreads her own in defense. “I never said that. I just said it was expensive.” Even though he’s paying attention to the road, he can feel her stare at him. “Do _you_ want to put an offer in?”

“Not if you don’t.” He shakes his head. “Well, I mean, I _do_ , but not if you don’t.”

“Okay. Well, I mean . . . put another offer in.” She pinches the bridge of her nose. “Sorry. It’s just – everything has been a little much. The travel – Danny – wedding – ” She reaches out and grabs his hand again. This time, he squeezes. “I can barely remember it. It had that amazing balcony, right?”

“Yeah. The nice one. Put some plants there – outdoor space to actually eat a meal – ”

“But not . . . like, run around in,” she murmurs, as if remembering.

“Yeah.” He nods. It’s one downfall – and something nearly impossible to get in the city, without making the effort to go to a park. And . . . the price. Suddenly, he’s starting to have doubts as well. “Look, I’m not saying we put down an offer like, right this second. Jackson said we had time . . .”

“Yeah,” she murmurs. “Yeah, time is good.” She heaves a big sigh. “I dunno if we should take Danny to lunch at Dad’s. If he’s _sick_ sick . . .”

“Well, he didn’t wake up with a fever,” he points out. Everybody is coming to this lunch, and it’ll be the first time Margot and her daughters will have met Danny in-person, besides weekend FaceTimes. “Let’s just get home, see how he’s doing. And if he isn’t, then he will be in a couple of days, and they’ll still be here.”

When they finally park in the driveway, before he gets out of the car, she pulls at his collar and kisses him, firmly, on the cheek. “What was that for?” he asks.

She grins up at him, impish. “For buying me a new mixer,” she says, patting the top of the box like it’s her new baby. But he guesses what she really means, and kisses her back – but this time on the mouth, and far less briefly.

-tbc-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> full disclosure - i was half-assing the brooklyn/queens real estate landscape, so apologies for any mistakes. :)


End file.
